A bigger splash: how did The Mermaid become China's biggest ever film?

The big splash

Ryan Reynolds isn’t the only one putting in “maximum effort” at the moment. Stephen Chow’s Chinese new-year sensation The Mermaid has make good on numerous records set last week to claim the title of the country’s highest grossing film: currently on 2.74bn yuan ($419.5m/£297.5m) to overtake previous record holder Monster Hunt’s 2.44bn yuan. That’s some pace – doing the business in just 11 days, as opposed to the two months it took Monster Hunt to achieve the feat (reportedly cooking the books in the process). The holiday period undoubtedly helped, as did Chow’s proven status as a Hong Kong hit-maker. But The Mermaid is that rarity among Chinese blockbusters: an original, not rooted in local mythology, with a distinctive directorial voice in the shape of Chow’s often grotesque brand of tomfoolery. Not to mention a plot – a property tycoon trying to destroy a marine reserve – that touches on real-world concerns. It looks like audiences over there are savouring the unusual taste of something fresh and piquant.

The Mermaid is the second time in under a year the country’s most-successful film record has been broken. 2015 also saw three others (Mojin: The Lost Legend; Lost in Hong Kong; Goodbye Mr Loser) surpass the record-holder prior to Monster Hunt, 2012’s Lost in Thailand. Frighteningly, China’s box office grew by nearly 50%, defying a general economic slowdown. Its films, just on the strength of the domestic market, register worldwide more and more often: Lost in Hong Kong is the highest pure-comedy opening worldwide ($106.8m), and last week in China was the single highest seven-day take ever.

The only thing missing now is Chinese films making a mark in overseas markets. It feels like The Mermaid – with a handful of strong reviews – stood a chance of making the first serious breakthrough. But this weekend’s $1m US take represents a measly 0.2% of its overall gross, the typical story for Chinese films wares abroad at the moment (Monster Hunt did a pathetic $32K in the US). There has been widespread criticism of Sony’s decision to restrict it to 35 theatres; all the more mystifying as Chow started to build a cult international audience in the early noughties, and his 2005 Kung Fu Hustle made a decent $17m in the States. The forgiving take? That the theatrical climate for foreign-language film is far harsher now, and The Mermaid looks just too quirky for widespread takeup. The conspiratorial one? Hollywood is burying the competition, especially as it hasn’t invested serious money in this one. Still, the week’s best screen-average (29K, twice Deadpool’s) is hard to ignore, and we’ll see if The Mermaid expands next frame. Your move, Sony.

The Disney animation

With Pixar on its books, you might have expected Disney’s own animation division to sit back and whistle. But since dropping 2D, it has stayed surprisingly forward-looking. Wreck-It Ralph, Frozen, Big Hero 6 and now Zootopia (or Zootropolis, if you’re European): all cinematic originals, mostly conceptually snappy. Zootopia takes an animated staple – the Madagascar-style creature feature – and puts a 21^st-century urban spin on it, its menagerie of animals leaving in peaceful coexistence nothing if not multicultural wish fulfilment. This weekend’s expansion to 22 territories – ahead of the 4 March US opening – looks promising. The four territories we have figures for are broadly ahead of Wreck-It Ralph and Big Hero 6, and close to the all-conquering Frozen: France (Z: $9.2m, WIR: $2.6m, Fr: $9.1m, BH6: $3m), Poland (Z: $1.2m, WIR: $417K, Fr: $993K, BH6: $583K), Mexico (Z: $4.5m, WIR: $3.9m, Fr: no figures, BH6: $4.8m), Italy (Z: $2.8m, WIR: $1.1m, Fr: $3.1m, BH6: $1.3m). Frozen had the advantage of being a perfectly placed Christmas feature in 2013, so Zootopia looks unlikely to match its $1.28bn. But with Easter coming up and a less geek-founded, more approachable premise than either Wreck-It Ralph or Big Hero 6, the latter’s $657.8m should be the minimum expected. CGI animation remains badly in need of new blood – last year’s Inside Out, scraping into the all-time top 10, was a rare newcomer in a once cutting-edge field short on them this decade.

The romcom

With disputes over pay for women very much ongoing, there have been small but significant signs of progress on screen – with Daisy Ridley and Charlize Theron making unignorable claims for the female action hero last year. Bridesmaids, in 2011, also ushered in a less needy, more frank brand of romcom – and Warner’s How to Be Single is next in that vein. Rebel Wilson, who had a bit-part in Bridesmaids, seems to be a compulsory part of such packages, her off-key energy making her the Zach Galifianakis-style wild card in these girl ensembles (cf Pitch Perfect). She pairs up with Dakota Johnson in How to Be Single, playing New York singletons; enough emergent star quality to give the film a fighting chance in overseas territories. Last year’s Trainwreck – starring Comedy Central alumnus Amy Schumer – lacked that element and suffered outside the US ($110m US gross/$30m overseas). How to Be Single isn’t opening quite as resoundingly as the glowingly reviewed Bridesmaids, an overseas powerhouse ($119m). But, across a well-spaced spread of territories, it’s holding its own and generally outdoing Pitch Perfect, whose $50m abroad helped kick off a franchise: UK (HTBS: $2.7m, Br: $5.6m; PP: $1.5m), Australia (HTBS: $2.3m, Br: $4.4m; PP: $2.7m), Mexico (HTBS: $574K, Br: $381K; PP: $61K), Russia (HTBS: $994K, Br: $1.3m; PP: $178K). A wan $17.9m US debut suggests a femme-centric romcom isn’t radical enough to de facto grab audiences there, but the concept still looks novel in emerging markets. Rising grosses there and decent ones with core audiences such as France (2 March) and Germany (7 April) could see How to Be Single top $100m.

Beyond Hollywood

A belated Chinese release for last year’s Japanese anime Boruto: Naturo the Movie saw it take around $6m for 17th place on the global chart. It’s the 11th film in the series based on the Masashi Kishimoto manga about a teenage ninja. Fox Star India’s Neerja – based on the story of a real-life 1986 Karachi airplane hijacking – debuted with a very commendable 22.01 crore in India ($3.2m) for an overall $5.1m and 19th place globally; Anil Kapoor’s daughter, rising actor Sonam, has been praised for her performance as the eponymous air hostess killed during the attack, as has director Ram Madhvani for a focused, low-key treatment.

Strictly speaking a chip off the Hollywood block, another significant regional release was Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon sequel Sword of Destiny – only featuring Michelle Yeoh from the 2000 cast, in addition to Hong Kong favourite Donnie Yen, with action-choreography sifu Yuen Woo-ping directing. Producers The Weinstein Company chose to film in English and dub into Mandarin (the original made its largely Cantonese-speaking cast deliver their lines phonetically), but it doesn’t seem to have had too catastrophic an impact on box office. $21.5m for the Chinese debut, No 2 in the market, is neither dazzling or disastrous, but leaves faint hopes of profitability when Netflix release the film in the west at the end of this week.

The future

Arguably the biggest slice of hieroglyph-heavy, Nile-valley hokum since 1994’s Stargate, Lionsgate’s Gods of Egypt gets the 30-country, US-plus-assorted-eastern-European/south-east-Asian-hinterland rollout typical of this kind of second-grade blockbuster material. Except with a $140m budget, the film – top teeth-gnasher Gerard Butler headlining as Egyptian bad boy Set – looks rather on the pricey side. Getting embroiled, like Ridley Scott’s Exodus, in a controversy over whitewashed casting was not a good start for director Alex Proyas. But that’s what you get these days when you try to sell kohl to Newcastle.

Top 10 global box office, 19-21 February

1. Deadpool, $140m from 75 territories. $491.7m cumulative – 52.1% international; 47.9% US

2. The Mermaid, $57m from 8 territories. $421m cum – 99.8% int; 0.2% US

3. Zootopia, $31.2m from 22 territories. $39m cum – 100% int

4. (New) Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny, $21m from 2 territories. $21.5m cum – 100% int

5. Kung Fu Panda 3, $19.7m from 18 territories. $294.1m cum – 60.2% int; 39.8% US

6. How to Be Single, $19.1m from 51 territories. $55.9m cum – 43.1% int; 56.9% US

7. The Monkey King 2, $13m from 11 territories. $157.6m cum – 99.6% int; 0.4% US

8. The Revenant, $12.4m from 51 territories. $381.6m cum – 56.7% int; 43.3% US

9. Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip, $12m from 53 territories. $215.5m cum – 60.8% int; 39.2% US

10. (New) Risen, $11.8m from 1 territory – 100% US